


Tears stream down your face

by Vicky



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: Angst, F/M, Minor Character Death, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2019-01-10 19:27:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12306093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vicky/pseuds/Vicky
Summary: Arthur was dead. Phryne had supported her aunt, but now, she needed someone to support her.





	Tears stream down your face

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time writing for this fandom. I hadn’t really intended to write for it, but this fic came almost fully formed in my mind, and since I’m going through a bit of a writer’s block, I decided not to contradict my Muse. This is set between _Murder and Mozzarella_ and _Death and Hysteria_. The title comes from Coldplay’s _Fix You_. I hope you enjoy it!

Jack raised his head from the latest Zane Grey novel when someone knocked at his door. A look at the clock on the mantle told him that it was close to midnight. He usually didn’t get any visitors at this late hour. His constables knew to reach him by phone if there was a case requiring his attention, and his neighbours are too considerate to disturb him unless there was an emergency.

He hadn't intended to stay up this late, but he hadn't been able to stop reading once he started. As always, it had felt like he had been in one of those far west towns with the scenes of the book playing around him. (Once or twice, he had even imagined himself as the main character, not that he would ever admit it out loud, especially when a certain lady detective was around to hear.)

Putting his book down next to the glass of whisky he had been nursing for most of the evening, he got up from his chair. He crossed the room to go open the door, wondering who he would find on the other side. Phryne Fisher, surprisingly, hadn't crossed his mind. And yet, here she was, standing on his doorstep, her eyes brimming with tears. This last thing had him concerned.

"Phryne?" he asked softly; now wasn't the time to be formal and call her Miss Fisher.

She didn't speak. She closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around his waist, her face pressing against his chest. He was about to ask her what was happening when he felt her whole body starting to shake with sobs. Questions could wait; he closed one arm around her, and walked backwards into his house until he could close the door without hurting her. His other arm wrapped around her and he held her tight against him.

Jack had seen her like this only once before, when they found Janey's body. She had sat down on the edge of the shallow grave, crying for the sister she had lost and finally found. That was the only time he had seen her break down.

Tonight, she was once again breaking down. He didn't know yet what had happened to prompt this rare reaction from her, but he decided to support her the only way he could, the way she needed him to. She would tell him, when she was ready, and until then, he would be there for her. He could only imagine that it was something serious. Phryne Fisher was the strongest woman he had ever known, and for her to be sobbing like this, she had to have received bad news.

Phryne calmed down after a long moment, but it still took a few more minutes before she raised her head from his chest. His shirt was soaked through with her tears but he didn’t care.

“What happened, Phryne?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper so as not to surprise her.

“Arthur…”

She only had time to say this before tears started to fall once more. But he didn’t need to hear more; he understood. He wrapped his arms even tighter around her, and buried a hand in her hair, and his face in her neck. He wanted to say something, anything, but all that came to his mind were platitudes that he was certain she didn’t want to hear.

“It’s not fair, Jack,” she murmured. “It’s not fair.”

“It never is,” he replied on the same tone.

Arthur was a sweet man, and Jack had always appreciated meeting with him. He could only imagine the pain Phryne and Mrs Stanley must be in. To lose someone so unexpectedly – as far as he knew – unleashed a kind of pain few people understood.

He felt Phryne slowly push away from him and he loosened his hold on her. The hand that had been in her hair came to rest on her cheek and he dried her tears with his thumb. A small smile played on her lips at his action.

Before he could speak and ask her if she needed anything, her lips were on his. Instinctively, he started to kiss her back. This kiss was nothing like the one at Café Réplique; this one was full of passion and Phryne was more than just a willing participant. She took the lead, taking what she wanted from him, barely waiting for him to follow. A part of Jack knew that he should put a stop to this, that she was upset, and they shouldn’t be doing this, but he wasn’t listening to it.

It was only when he felt her fingers starting to unbutton his shirt that he came back to his senses. He broke the kiss and grabbed her hands before she could undo more buttons.

“No, Phryne. I… we can’t…”

“I can’t… I don’t want to be alone, tonight. Jack, please…”

Jack was certain that she had never had to beg a man to take her to bed – not that he _ever_ thought about it – but he heard the desperation in her voice. She didn’t want to be left alone with her thoughts and he could understand that. A part of him was happy that she sought him out instead of someone else, but he wouldn’t give in. He _couldn’t_ give in; It would probably break them if he did. Hey had come to an understanding only a couple of weeks ago, and he refused to ruin that for a night with her.

But there was something else that he could do, if she agreed.

She tried to kiss him again but he took a step back, putting some distance between them but still holding onto her wrists.

“Not like this, Phryne. You can stay here tonight, if you want, but not for this.”

“Why?” she asked, hurt by his rejection.

“Because you matter too much for me to let it happen this way,” he answered, honestly.

There was a moment when Jack thought she would turn and leave to go find any man willing to bed her. He had known it was a possibility when he refused her, and he promised himself that he wouldn’t blame her if she did. But she stayed. She nodded in understanding, and he felt some of the tension leave her body. He released her hands, letting his fall to his sides. Phryne lifted one of her hands to his chest, and he thought for a moment that she would try to unbutton his shirt again, but she only traced the stain left by her make-up with her fingers.

“I made a mess.”

“Nothing that can’t be cleaned,” he assured her.

“I’ll ask Mr Butler…,” she started, but he interrupted her.

“It’s fine, I’ll take care of it.”

“I must look terrible,” she said, trying for a joke.

“Not at all,” he replied, truthfully. “We should get you to bed.” He winced at his choices of words and continued. “It didn’t come out right…”

“It’s alright, Jack.”

They smiled at each other and, for a moment, it was like everything was normal, like it wasn’t past midnight, like Arthur hadn’t died.

Jack held out his hand and she took it. He led her to the bedroom and stopped briefly on the threshold. He had imagined this moment more times than he could remember, but he had never thought that it would happen this way.

“Me too, Jack,” Phryne said, squeezing his hand, as if she had read his thoughts.

He finally opened the door and led her inside. He let go of her hand and walked to a chest of drawers, opening one and taking out a pair of pyjamas.

“They’re not new, but they’re clean. They might be too big, but you…”

“I’m sure they’re fine,” she replied, taking them from him.

“Let me show you the bathroom. There are clean towels under the sink. If you need anything, just tell me.”

“Thank you, Jack. Not just for this,” Phryne said, gesturing to the pyjamas and the room she was standing in, “but for being here when I need you.”

“Always.”

He closed the bathroom door behind him and went back to the living-room. He picked up his unfinished glass and turned off the lamp. He locked the front door as he walked past it on his way to the kitchen to wash his glass. There, he pulled a clean glass out of a cabinet and filled it with water, before carrying it back with him to the bedroom. He tried very hard not to listen to Phryne as she went through her evening routine in his bathroom. As it was, it would already be difficult enough to know that she had been in there.

Placing the glass on the bedside table, he changed into his pyjamas and grabbed a pillow and a spare blanket from the closet just as she came back into the room. He froze as he saw her wearing nothing but his pyjamas. They _were_ too big for her – she had to roll up the sleeves and the pant legs several times – but his mind was telling him that he had never seen her looking better. Once they had stopped taking notice of how the pyjamas were fitting her, his eyes went back to her freshly washed face and they met hers. There was amusement in them; she had obviously noticed his giving her a look-over and appreciated it.

“I, uh…” he cleared his throat before continuing. “I left some water for you, should you need it.”

“Thank you. What are you doing with those?”

“I’m going to sleep on the couch.”

“It can’t be comfortable,” Phryne replied.

It wasn’t, she was right; he couldn’t stretch his body on the couch, and the cushions had seen better days.

“I’ll be fine,” he still assured her with a smile.

“We can share,” she offered, and continued as he opened his mouth to protest. “Just to sleep. I really don’t want to be alone.”

He considered this for a moment. There was nothing wrong in sharing a bed, nothing was going to happen. They were friends.

“Alright.”

“Good. Now, which side do you sleep on?”

“The left side.”

After he said that, she climbed on the other side of the bed and got under the covers. He hesitated for a brief moment before doing the same. He felt her moving, trying to get comfortable in a strange bed. When she stilled, he turned his head to look at her. She was lying on her side, facing him. Sadness was still there in her eyes but a small smile played on her lips.

“I always knew that the first time sharing a bed with you would be different, but not like that.”

He smiled, having had the same thought when he led her in here.

“The first time?” he asked, turning towards her. “I believe that we have shared a bed before, Miss Fisher, even though I was unconscious at the time.”

“How did you know? I made sure to leave long before you woke up.”

“You might have left, but your scent lingered.”

“And yet, you said nothing at the time,” Phryne replied.

“You didn’t say anything, either.”

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“Why did you stay?” Jack asked, having wondered about it since that morning.

“Mac said you would be fine, but I didn’t want to leave you alone, just in case. I stayed on top of the covers, though. Less tempting,” she added with a smile.

“Do you want me to…”

“No,” she interrupted him before he could finish his question.

“Did you really undress me?” he asked, this question having also been in his mind since she told him.

“I wanted to,” she replied, her fingers touching the buttons of his pyjama top. “But no. Mr Butler did. I want you to look at me when I do it.”

Not ‘if’, ‘when’; this was what they were heading to, and they both knew it. His heart started to beat faster at the way she was looking at him. There was no doubt that she could feel it as her hand rested lightly against his chest. But it was a dangerous subject to talk about while lying in the same bed.

“Maybe we should talk about something else,” he said, and she nodded.

They fell into a comfortable silence. Jack felt more than saw her hand trail up his chest, over his shoulder and down his arm that was resting on top of the covers. She took his hand in hers and intertwined their fingers. They had held hands before but most of the time, it had been for practical reasons. Only once had it been for comfort, like tonight. That had been when they found Janey. As she was crying for her sister, she had instinctively reached out behind her with her hand. He had been there and held her hand in his, supporting her the only way he had known how at the time.

After a moment, Phryne was the one to break the silence.

“He left us in his sleep. He never woke up.”

“You don’t…”

“I need to,” she said, and he nodded in understanding. “Aunt Prudence was the one to find him. She hadn’t expected… None of us did. He had always had a weak heart, but the doctor saw him last week and he never said we could lose him.”

“I’m sorry, Phryne. I know that these words are useless…”

“You’re here, Jack. You let me stay when you could have told me to leave after I wanted…” She paused, taking a deep breath before she repeated, “you’re here. Aunt Prudence’s butler called to inform me,” she continued, “and I went to Rippon Lea. You should have seen her… She couldn’t stop crying. I alternated between sitting with her and making arrangements.”

What she wasn’t saying but was clear to Jack was that she hadn’t allowed herself to cry. Phryne had supported her aunt through one of the toughest days of her life and hadn’t stopped long enough to mourn the cousin she adored. Until she showed up on his doorstep.

“She didn’t want to go to bed, claimed that she wouldn’t be able to sleep. I called Mac and she gave her a light sedative. I asked Bert and Cec to stay with her. I couldn’t… I needed to leave.”

“And you came here.”

“I didn’t want to go back to Wardlow.” She paused again, and sniffed to keep the tears at bay. “I can’t believe he’s gone. He was such a bright soul.”

“It was impossible not to smile when he was around,” Jack concurred.

“You know, he liked you a lot.”

“He did?”

“Of course! You treated him like he was like any other person while still being considerate of his feelings. You earned a few points from Aunt P for that. She always despised people treating Arthur differently, as if he was a lesser human being.”

“He wasn’t. If anything, he was better than some people I know.”

“Yes, he was.”

He could see that she was touched by what he said about her cousin. But it was only the truth. Jack might not have spent a lot of time with Arthur, but whenever he saw the man, he liked spending some time with him. Rare were the people who saw the world with such innocence and Arthur had been one of them. He had often reminded Jack to forget the darkness of the world to focus on its brightness. He would never forget that.

“He asked me an odd question, once,” Phryne said, a smile on her lips.

“What was it?”

“He asked me whether we were ever going to have a party like Guy and Isabella. I admit that it took me a while to understand what he really meant with that.”

It took Jack a moment too to realise what Arthur had been asking. When he did, he didn’t blush – and he was proud of that – but only smiled. No matter what some people might have thought about him, Arthur had had a brilliant mind. He had managed to see something when the two people concerned had all but been blind about it. Still, they would have ended up disappointing the man on the subject of the party.

“I’m not sure I can pull off the pirate costume as well as your cousin, and I don’t think the blond wig would suit you.”

“You’d be surprised,” she replied with a teasing smile.

“Do you mean?”

“It was right after René. I wanted to be someone different. It didn’t last though. Some people,” the way she said it left Jack in no doubt that she meant men, “liked it, but I quickly realised that hiding who I was because of him was the wrong thing to do. It meant that, despite what I thought, he still had a hold on me. Well, that and the bleach ruined my hair so much I had to cut it short, like when I was a girl in Collingwood.”

“You kept it that way.”

“Less work, and it makes people notice me.”

“It’s not the first thing I noticed about you,” he said.

“No? Then, what was it?” Phryne asked, obviously curious.

Jack had two choices: he could lie and tease her or he could be honest. He would be honest; they had both been since she had first stepped into his arms.

“The first thing I noticed about you was the fact that you were standing in the middle of my crime scene, and didn’t care a bit about it.”

“Really, Jack? You didn’t notice my eyes or my lips?”

“I’m sorry to disappoint,” he replied.

“You don’t. Quite the opposite. Your dedication to your work is one of the things I always admired about you.”

“I can say the same about you, even though it had often caused me grief.”

“Could you lose your job because of me?” Phryne asked, suddenly serious.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Of course, I worry. Tell me, Jack.”

“My case closure rates are good, have been long before you arrived in Melbourne. I don’t cause trouble for Russell Street, or at least, not more than other officers. They would need to find a better excuse than your interference in my cases, or our friendship,” he added, knowing that would be worrying her too, “to fire me.”

“Good. I would hate to have to break in another Detective-Inspector.”

He recognized the teasing and was about to reply in the same way when she yawned, loudly. She had tried to stifle it, but it had been no use.

“You should get some sleep. It’s almost two,” he said, glancing at his alarm clock; he was surprised that it was so late. “I have to go to work, tomorrow, but I’ll leave the spare key in the kitchen for you.”

“No, it’s fine. I can’t leave when you do.”

“No need, Phryne,” he said, on a tone that brooked no argument.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Goodnight, Phryne,” he said, turning off the bedside lamp.

“Goodnight.”

It didn’t take long for Phryne to fall asleep after the long, emotional day that she had had. Just as sleep was about to claim him, Jack realised that Phryne’s hand was still in his. Even in her sleep, she hadn’t let go of it. He had no intention to either, until he absolutely had to.

 

Fin


End file.
